Daily Archives: September 8, 2014

Deputy Principal Melanie Mabotha along with the school librarian and fund administrator Rudi Riek

Today the Film Industry Fund delivered 263 new books to the Astra School for disabled children in Montana. These books where purchased at a cost of R10 000,00 from Biblionef SA, another NGO who donate books to organisations in need. By purchasing these books from Biblionef we not only gave the Astra School good quality South African themed books but the money Biblionef generates through book sales enables them to donate more books to other causes.
Biblionef was established in France in 1989 by Max Vegelin van Claerbergen, a former Dutch ambassador. It is an international network of independent non-profit organisations and there are currently five depots worldwide – the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Suriname (South America) and South Africa, serving children worldwide with book donations.
The South African organisation is the only one on the African continent and came into being in 1998, with the financial assistance of the international Biblionef body and the government of the Netherlands. Its overarching goal is to provide access to good storybooks to children.
Biblionef SA is a NPC (non-profit company) that operates according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation’s (UNESCO) Book Donation Charter.
This donation was made out of the communal fund and was a suggestion by our friends at Reach for a Dream.

Some of the kids getting ready for a story in the library

Photo courtesy of Biblionef SA showing examples of some of the titles given to the Astra School today

help2read is a developmental organisation which was founded in 2005. Although their beginnings were based on an established UK child literacy charity, over the years the programme has been adapted to meet the needs of South African society. help2read is working to address national development in South Africa in two ways.

Firstly, help2read addresses child literacy, a key component to national development. help2read works in public primary schools with learners in grades 2-4 who are struggling with literacy. They pair each learner with a trained volunteer from the community who provides twice weekly one-on-one tutoring.

Secondly, help2read address the lack of skills development and unemployment statistics within the adult South African population. They are currently piloting a version of their programme in which we specifically recruit literate, unemployed adults. This pilot includes extended skills development trainings and other incentives for their Literacy Tutors who then in turn help a larger amount of struggling learners than those volunteers in our standard programme.

help2read currently operates in communities throughout the Western Cape and parts of Gauteng using a largely volunteer workforce. We are currently active in 100s of schools and have helped thousands of children. We are actively working on expanding our programme to the more rural provinces of South Africa.

The Film Industry Fund today donated R30 000,00 to Help2read which will be used at the Sid.G Rule Primary School in Grassy Park. The money is enough to identify 25 learners with reading challenges who will be given two half hour individual reading lessons per week for one full year.

This donation was part of the communal fund within the Film industry Fund which is earmarked to be used in previously disadvantaged areas only.